Hi, I'm Andrea Marshall, an affiliate scholar of the Centre for Media and Celebrity Studies in Toronto, and a librarian. Thank you for checking out my work. I hope it inspires you to investigate how you can become involved in the zine scenes both digital and local to your communities. Zines exist within the hybrid recesses of cultural consciousness.

They are subcultural relics of the errors prior to the internet, and they are knowledge of infrastructures that overtly disrupt mainstream cultural perspectives. They also function as boundary artifacts that bridge gaps between analog print, protocols, and digital manifestations of data such as PDF and hyperlinks.

Niccolini et al. in 2012 observed that we look at boundary objects as boundary devices, but also as epistemic things, objects of activities and infrastructures. Zines as quote unquote epistemic things, unquote, emerges cultural representations, but also adapt to service attitudes about, quote, the world

that leads to the deposition of knowledge in a form from which others can draw, unquote, as Reinberger et al. commented in 2005. Zines traditionally are laypersons objects with content that is created for and consumed by other laypersons. They possess rebellious potential in that not only do they represent the ideas which they espouse and the cultures which generate these notions, but they communicate ideologies across social margins.

Our clerk Parsons indicated in 2017 that quote over the last decade, zines were self published booklets ranging dramatically in style and content have made a resurgence. It is impossible to estimate the number of contemporary zines in the United States,

whose subversive hodgepodge texts are not cataloged in the Library of Congress were issued ISSNs. Today, there are more than 60 active zine festivals, dozens of distros, just interjecting in the quote here, distributors that zine slang, and stores and nearly 120 zine libraries and archives across the United States.

The humble do it yourself DIY zine perseveres in spite of, but perhaps more accurately because of the meteoric rise of blogging and social media platforms, unquote. Zines occupy the digital and analog terrain simultaneously. However, Clark Parsons also interjects the quote, the polarization of zines

versus blogs also precludes a more nuanced framework, the position zine making is a feminist practice, working in conjunction with digital media, distinct but symbiotic discursive strategies for coping with structures of power that privilege somebody's marginalizing others within their public sphere, and quote, because zines are social objects too.

And they draw their influence from underground and nonlinear processes that make them disruptive and disorderly. The quote unquote data journeys as a Gino calls them, of zines are multiple messy and mutable as social objects, they do not pursue linear trajectories and as knowledge infrastructures they are porous.

Furthermore, data themselves are messy and mutable zines capture this reality through their lack of formalized classification indexing and demographic archives during the creation of them, and their distribution. Well Gino expands on this concluding that quote it is a naive fantasy that data have an immediate relation to the phenomena of the world that they are objective and some strong ontological sense of that term that they are backs of the world speaking

directly to us, and quote zines as boundary objects are subjective social and subversive data artifacts that not only demonstrates of cultural ideologies, but collaboratively create communities practice through shared interest and perspectives.

Far person supports this observation that zine making as an accessible DIY media practice that operates outside of both marketplace logic and socio political constraints enables the invention and circulation of counter discourses that might otherwise by no outlet within the commercial media landscape unquote zines such as major threat punk rock boundary object designed by

academics and educators to reach laypersons is a data artifact that well the proclaims how zines occupied digital and physical communities and resist conventional classification schemes camp founder of major threat states, if you find a copy of this online, please share it print a couple email it to friends posted anywhere and everywhere.

Help this movement to improve education grow unquote. This particular zine uses the viral philosophical practices of the digital realm to encourage widespread meme awareness and print formats and an online platforms as well. Major threat promotes the Morris of the pump literati to dismantle traditional academia and

simultaneously calls for rebellion from laypersons to affect this change from places of privilege. The embodied contradiction in the zine as data thing definitely reveals how zines resist binary classifications as just literature or ephemeral objects or digital representations of counter cultural interaction.

literature supports rebellious data things as it cause attention to contradictions as reflexive spaces where people can delve into transgressive knowledge infrastructures built through collaborative social and subjective interactions within various communities. Zines are one crucial example of the sundry possibilities to engage in conversations beyond the cross disciplinary and ask difficult questions about accessibility privilege and diversity.

The scholar Chris has argued that quote zines occupy a middle ground between traditional research papers or essays and web based media such as blogs. Unlike research papers zine style is decidedly informal images are hand drawn or cut and pasted by hand.

The informal creative and participatory character of zines. Unlike blogs zines are physical objects that can be held and passed from person to person by hand, unquote. Yet as with our earlier example of major threat scenes are also digital objects that circulate in online environments. They are cultural artifacts that are constructed as counter cultural data objects as crease it finds quote zines share commonalities with independent media

of earlier women's movements, such as scrapbooks pamphlets and manifestos unquote. The scholar see a way to expands on this countercultural significance into other DIY objects, quote, zines may be seen as an extension of genres like artists sketchbooks chapbooks surrealist games and manifestos of art history and quote, in fact,

CC bagelman and Jay bagelman comment on this even further by linking zines to quote philosophical movements like surrealism used small runs of self published material decorated in collage and brick collage as a form for ideas, unquote, zines have also according to the scholar

and niche niche and boat involved to include pump fans names from the 1970s onward. And since the 1990s more and more women got involved. Zines as symbols of countercultural and grassroots community values within their historical antecedents can you need to fascinate

information professionals and educators, many librarians such as myself are fascinated by scenes, and as Thomas has commented on how librarians particular quote have expressed interest in collecting and teaching zines and regular seek regularly seek opportunities to co teach to present the classes librarians can also assist with a zine assembly and reproduction outside the classroom.

A librarian may know of other faculty teaching zines of campus resources and contacts for planning a zine event, and of relevant special collections the library librarians do have access to knowledge infrastructures that includes special collections and the opportunity to engage with communities and classrooms in various ways that students and faculty might not be able to do themselves to

Laney Marner and Schindler have argued that quote the zine format becomes a vehicle that integrates key skills such as research techniques, critical information literacy and concise argument synthesis with course specifically learning outcomes and boat. The scholar limb expands this to include that Blair librarians, particularly as potential countercultural producers of knowledge infrastructures,

as well as information allies, when she constructed quote librarians as insider ethnographers, and quote her term within their She states, there is the sense that librarians don't participate in DIY and grassroots communities, but they do DIY libraries

and archives such as zine libraries and social centers are also autonomous archives, because they are often temporary or transitory collections, and are not representative of an easily identified or categorized group of people. These libraries don't often ask for recognition from external institutions, such as tax registration or incorporation, a feature of other more focused and solidified

community libraries and archives like local history societies and private lending libraries. The UK scholar as Britain has expressed the odd status of librarians in zine spaces, as well as difficulties presented in terms of access authority and agency when zine values and countercultural resistance encounter institutional barriers and metadata management, she states, due to

their unconventional handmade nature zines with an institutional collections are often considered special collection material and kept in closed access conditions and so library users are unable to browse freely and generally have to put in specific requests for material which could also be potentially off putting.

She then continues to say some zine makers are reticent for their zines to be part of library collections, particularly institutional libraries as the controlled own nature of something like a library collection seems to be the antithesis of many of the fundamental ideas that are central to zine making inter independence estrangement for mainstream culture, and the zine

is ephemeral object and quote zines as artistic expression sentimental confessions cultural critiques and the community manifestos that they are established themselves as non binary objects. They disrupt digital spaces through an insistence on print media as a way to spread means of resistance and revolt. They disrupt analog spaces through insistence that community and creativity can expand and grow through digital collections.

Allison pipe Meyer observed in 2008 that quote print culture scholars and art scholars have created useful vocabularies for analyzing the sculptural the textual convergence that zines and act. However, neither set of scholars has devoted much attention to zines, because they are what Gregory show it terms, dark

matter work that functions outside of is, and is therefore invisible to the established art world, and to academic scholarship, unquote. She also further the idea that we should look at zines as academics, in

order to understand not only called counter cultural production and reaction, the counter cultural action. And to further this idea, the scholar a committee commented that as readers, the zine challenges are established reading strategies by offering text objects, which explicitly explore the intersection of narrative and materiality, and this disruptive

sort of broken binary is explored in digital and analog spaces. And furthermore, see a waiter has also indicated that the zine is a non binary object demystifies knowledge infrastructures as hidden from the lay person, rather it builds infrastructures through community and creativity instead that are public.

She says more importantly, making a scene does not require training initiation or education as a prerequisite as the answer is simply a person who creates a zine evaluating of democracy and artistic accessibility may be liberating as well as problematic in terms of issues of artistic expression and quality.

For example, artists and teachers are limited by fonts formats and copyright restrictions if we post art on Facebook and other sites, the physical practice of zine making by hand allows creators to approach authorship creation and the page itself as considerations to be revised or reconsidered.

Some zines are more well known than others among readers but the notions of quality of player and interesting and shifting combination of subject matter, technical skill passion and personality genres like zines offer a playful space for experimentation and improvisation around artistic considerations of typography found art collage and visual culture zines may be employed complexly as

informal sketchbooks polished handmade artists books substitute artists trading cards and exhibition cards and hybrid formats to serve an array of our artistic purposes. The scholar Mr bold also discusses the making is having grassroots outreach through digital spaces, and why it's critical for zine communities to be diverse, active and visible.

Bold says historically zines have been an alternative outlet for niche topics or writers writing that are ignored by mainstream media scenes are significant because they offer the opportunity for connection community and networking between those interested in those diverse topics despite this, there has been many criticisms that diversity and race class and age are

underrepresented in the zine community, the developments in digital technology have enabled scenes to extend into the online sphere. This increased access has resulted in increased participation by readers and writers zines and DIY self publishing have helped to change the way that consumers engage with content by turning passive consumers, she states into active cultural producers.

Finally, a McNutt observed in 2021 that scenes create agency. And right now, zines express community because zines about you, zines allow for personal expression in a manner that most other mediums do not. This is likely due to a history with individualistic individualistic or alternative cultures, as well

as the amorphous nature of their form. Typically any approach to their designing content is valid. The freedom of personal expression is that's not bound by the restrictive words found in other forms for instance,

zines can fill this gap by offering a flexible format that itself has a close connection with personal expression aligned with the form. So zines are an expression and a creation that are aligned with the form of those who produce them, and the communities that read them. Thank you very much for your time today and have a wonderful time looking at other conference talks and thank you for attending my talk.